In which I play the role of Old Testament prophet

Last week — would you believe it, with Passover just two weeks away! — a plague of locusts struck the Middle East, leaving behind a trail of agricultural destruction and countless news editors to argue over whether the plague was indeed Biblical in its proportions:

So there was hail, and fire flashing up amidst the hail — וַיְהִי בָרָד–וְאֵשׁ, מִתְלַקַּחַת בְּתוֹךְ הַבָּרָד

As long as I’m quoting the Bible, it can’t hurt to turn this into a Dvar Environment — and let’s be honest, it can never hurt to turn something into a Dvar Environment — so here goes: If we (mankind) continue our quest to burn every last trace of fossil fuel that can physically be extracted from the earth — for evidence we’re trying, see “fire ice”, shale oil, tar sands, natural gas, and friends — we can expect to see a lot more headlines referencing Biblical plagues.

Sure, climate change will decrease frog (2) populations and melt hail (7) into rain, but on balance, I don’t think we’re going to like it very much.

So at the risk of sounding alarmist — but really, we could use more prophets of doom — unless we find a way to turn out the lights (9), we may have a lot more dead on our hands than just all the firstborn of Egypt (10). And speaking of firstborn, we’ll have also squandered our birthright, and our children’s birthright, and our children’s children’s birthright…